I credit yearly attendance at a homeschool convention with keeping me sane, especially in the early years of homeschooling. I was reminded of why I chose to homeschool in the first place and was equipped with tools for continuing.

But securing childcare and maneuvering a stroller were often a challenge. My husband usually called wanting to know when I would be home. The answer depended on how much screaming I could hear in the background.

A Homeschool Conference From the Comfort of Home

Now we have the opportunity to attend a homeschool conference wherever we are. We can listen and participate in iHomeschool Studio’s Online Webinar (Click here to view more details) live while the littles are in bed or on mobile devices while the kids are in activities.

If we can’t listen to all the talks we’re interested in live, we can listen to recordings while we’re showering, exercising, or traveling. Webinars allow busy spouses to participate, too.

I’m thrilled to be presenting on Valentine’s Day at 8:30pm Central time on How to Guide the Gift in Your Child. Preparing this talk made a huge difference in my parenting. I hope you’ll join me for a discussion of what it really means to have a gifted or talented child and how you can parent and teach them effectively.

The range and quality of sessions offered by iHomeschool Studio will impress you. I have 14 years of experience listening to homeschool speakers and I’m still excited to listen in! Tickets will go on sale here on January 28th for $25, which covers four days of inspiration, discounts and giveaways, and 24 MP3s of the sessions.

I’m also delighted to offer a free admission to one fortunate reader.

Please enter the giveaway and let your friends know about the chance to hear some outstanding homeschool speakers–no travel required.

Last year I bought my daughter, Elaina, a Zentangle book and some pens for Christmas. I bought myself a book, too, and discovered that I was zentangling when it was called doodling.

It turns out that doodling is good for you and produces some pretty cool looking art, too.

The problem was, I didn’t have any place to put my zentangles. I Googled for notebook templates so I could make my own notebook using my Zutter binder, but couldn’t find any. You know what they say about necessity! Microsoft Word to the rescue. I downloaded and installed this script font and block font for the initial. I then created a cover and inside page template, copied them onto acid-free cardstock, added an acetate cover and bound the book with silver coils. The finishing touch was some black and white ribbon I had lying around.

My daughter saw me making my notebook and begged me to make one for her, which I promptly did. We zentangled the front covers of our notebooks in pencil first and then used acid-free black marker to go over the design. The inside pages allow you to add four zentangles each.

If you need a gift for a kid or someone who’s at all crafty (not artistic, because no art skills are required), you’ll love a zentangle notebook. It’s fun to make and would make a great accompaniment to a zentangle book and pen set. If you don’t want to create this yourself or if you don’t have a binder, you could have it put together at an office store.

I’ve struggled to find a homeschool record keeping system that works for my family for nine years and I’ve finally found it! I’m sharing it with readers of Blessed Beyond a Doubt today. I hope you enjoy the post and Jill’s fabulous blog, too. Most of all, I hope I can help you make your homeschool record keeping easier. You’ll want to read the post for an explanation, but here’s a direct link to the form you need.